Everyone Should Be Taking Berberine with Carrie Pattison, Natural Factors National Educator
Sometimes we’re asked, “What’s the one supplement everyone should be taking?”
This is a difficult question to answer. So much of it depends on the individual's needs and our health is far too complex to be remedied or maintained with a single nutrient. We usually point people to our CORE 4 Supplements (multivitamin, omega-3, probiotic, greens powder), but if you’re looking for one supplement that has widespread benefits that nearly everyone can benefit from, it’s hard not to throw berberine in the mix as well. Berberine is a compound that can be extracted from many plants, including those of the Berberis genus. It’s an alkaloid compound, which is a naturally occurring nitrogen compound that’s most commonly found in the plant kingdom. It should also be noted that berberine has a history extending back to ancient medicine, but modern studies have confirmed again and again how effective this compound is in restoring optimal health.
Meet Carrie:
On this week’s episode we’re speaking with Carrie Pattison. Carrie is a national educator for Natural Factors and licensed herbalist and is excited to share with you how berberine and another nutrient called PEA can benefit your life. Berberine is widely recognized for it’s ability to optimize blood sugar levels, even to the extent of competing with current pharmaceuticals, but it’s other extensive benefits make it one supplement that should be a part of everyone’s supplement regimen. We take a deep dive into the world of berberine and PEA, including it’s historical background, it’s many benefits, and success stories.
Some Topics We Discuss:
What is berberine and why would someone want to take it? (5:02)
What is AMPK and how does berberine affect it? (8:20)
Should someone take berberine as a preventative measure or only if there is an acute measure? (14:50)
What is PEA? (21:02)
Some key takeaways from this episode:
Berberine does just as good a job as metformin and has less price to it and has far less risk and side effects as far as blood sugar. (8:00)
Insulin resistance can be devastating our health. (12:00)
Your body creates PEA on its own, so supplementing will further enhance its benefits, specifically on the endocannabinoid system. (23:02)
PEA can be an incredibly powerful tool for those that have neuropathy. (25:58)
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CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL SHOW TRANSCRIPT
Brian Strickland: Hello listeners, welcome back to The Holistic Navigator Podcast where we believe in the body's ability to heal itself if it's given the proper nutrients and care it deserves. My name is Brian Strickland. I'm the producer of the show and here with me in the studio as always is your host Ed Jones. On today's episode we're speaking with Carrie Pattison. Carrie is an herbalist and National Educator for Natural Factors and she joins [00:01:00] us to speak about two specific nutrients that fight hard in the battle to regain optimal health: berberine and PEA. If you've never heard of these two supplements, you're not alone, but they both have incredible healing powers that's widespread and should be part of every one supplement regimen. I'm going to keep this intro short and sweet because we've got a lot of ground to cover. So here's your host, Mr. Ed Jones.
Ed Jones: Thank you again Brian. And today I have another amazing podcast that I actually did not even see coming and it was kind of formed a few weeks ago and I was very excited when I saw that we put this together. And rarely do I talk about specifically supplements on the Holistic Navigator, but there are two that must be addressed and must be known I think by anyone who is embracing self-care using nutritional, holistic means. You know, I'd say this often 70% [00:02:00] of the world still accesses botanical medicines for the management of their health. You wouldn't know that reading the headlines in this country because you seem to think that you know, anything goes wrong with us, you run to the conventional medical model and they're going to, you know, fix me. Well, I think because of the pandemic is really opened people's eyes to the shortcomings of traditional medicine. If I'm in a car wreck, have a UTI terribly, or pneumonia, I want conventional modalities, but there's so much about chronic disease that is poorly poorly addressed on that platform. And I think anyone who's listening to me over the past 80 something podcasts certainly understands that there are different philosophies regarding, you know, how to stay well and how to get well if you're chronically unhealthy and again this this but pandemic has really brought to the surface the risk of being unhealthy. Well saying that I [00:03:00] have a wonderful guest today Carrie Pattison. She's a practicing herbalist licensed acupuncturist and trained in homebirth midwives,graduate from the National University of Natural Medicine, serves as National educator for Natural Factors, and Adjunct professor of Herbal studies at Huntington University at Health Sciences and welcome to The Holistic Navigator, Carrie.
Carrie Pattison: Thank you. Thank you so much Ed. I'm really excited to be here today.
Ed Jones: Well, I'm going to go ahead and let the cat out of the bag about the two things. We're going to talk about. Yeah. Yeah, when people are listening, you know, if they for some reason already knew everything about one or the other then they would they would know what to do. But I doubt very few people know about one of these and the other one no one's going to know about I will almost guarantee.
Carrie Pattison: Quite mysterious.
Ed Jones: They are but they're also quite effective in the management of poor health. [00:04:00] One is berberine and the second is something called PEA. I'm not going to even pretend to be able to pronounce the long word. I will let you do that if you feel comfortable into the discussion. But both of these supplements are something that at least mentally everyone who is aging needs to have these in their toolbox, whether it be physically or mentally so they're ready to embrace it if they or a loved one has some certain reason to address the issues at hand. So first off I think because that maybe berberine is a little more well known let's talk about that because it has risen to the top in the past five to 10 years with vast studies on PubMed and many functional medicine practitioners and people who are you know, practicing holistic medicine are using berberine on a very regular basis. [00:05:01] And so maybe explain to the listeners what it is and why someone might want to consider this?
Carrie Pattison: Yeah, so it's interesting the other day I was based upon what you were just saying. I thought this is fascinating. I actually looked up in the Oxford dictionary what the definition of a drug was and according to the Oxford dictionary drug is they define it as “a medicine or other substance, which has some physiological effect when ingested or otherwise introduced into the body,.” So I was like, oh that's the definition of a plant. That's the definition of berberine, actually. It's as really amazing active phytochemical. It's an alkaloid compound and I think you know listeners will know alkaloids somewhat we talked about like coffee has alkaloids in it, chocolate has alkaloids in it, kava, [00:06:02] opium has alkaloids in it. And so alkaloids are these compounds in plants and really at the end of the day how we can define an alkaloid is it's a compound that actually does something in the body and berberine is one of those where it is no matter what part of the body it works in it's doing something. I actually have not come across study yet saying this doesn't do something. Every study that they've done they're like, wow, we just discovered something more. We just discovered something more about its kind of broad-reaching health benefits.
Ed Jones: Well, that's a great intro for it because you know, I know from my experience and I certainly have recommended it pretty readily over the years but more and more in the past five than I ever did before because it has effects on digestive systems, and liver, and brain, health heart, nervous system, endocrine systems and [00:07:02] something called AMPK which is incredibly important to understand if you are wanting to age gracefully feel your best not fall apart at 55 to 60 like many people are falling apart. But the number one thing of course I recommend it for and I know you have to be cautious that you can't say certain things but, you know people who are trying to manage blood sugar, people who may be candidates for metformin or other drugs, but yet they have chosen to go the path of functional nutrition instead of pharmaceuticals. And because berberine is easier on the body than metformin because metformin can be a little difficult for some people with gastrointestinal disorders and and and. I don't think it's a terrible drug. In fact, I have said over the many years, I think there's about there's less than 10 what I would call stellar drugs that I think the risk of benefit the benefit generally out is the risk and I've [00:08:02] kind of been included metformin and that in some cases. But the truth is berberine does just as good a job and has less price to it and has far less risk and side effects as far as blood sugar. But let's go into this ampk. If you could explain how berberine affects this compound in the body and the reason why we should be concerned of this.
Carrie Pattison: Well, I thought that maybe I'll jump into AMPK, but I think your listeners would be we really really interested in kind of the historical reason that we found that a berberine is so supportive for something like blood sugar regulation and it goes back to the historical usage of berberine. Berberine has just always been known as there are 6 different plants that it comes from by the way. So it's a compound that lives in six different plants and it's always just kind of historically been known for digestive support. So diarrhea [00:09:02] specifically and this is where when I was looking into AMPK I was looking into all of these health benefits and I'm like, what is the history? Like, how did we determine that it was working on all of these cellular levels. Actually in the early 1980s there were Chinese physicians at and this is our I love I love looking at kind of like historical things, but this was the number I think is number 422 Hospital of People's Liberation Army in Chang Chung in China where they had the type 2 diabetes ward and they had an outbreak of diarrhea on the ward. So all of the physicians they knew historically using Chinese herbs not there were these herbs these Huang herbs these yellow herbs that were just used for diarrhea. So they were [00:10:02] giving all of the Huang the berberine and lo and behold saw all of these clinical changes in blood sugar metabolism. And what you were saying, like I find the most fascinating thing about berberine from the research is that it's not working the same way that Western methods are. Instead it's really what it's doing is it's influencing glucose metabolism by increasing the expression of insulin receptors. And then what we're able to do is decrease insulin resistance. So it's just simply making the whole system work more efficiently and that's where AMPK comes into play. AMPK is another one of those long funny words adenosine monophosphate activated protein kinase. I like to refer to it as the metabolic. [00:11:02] master switch because that's just a lot easier to say and it's a type of enzyme. So it's not a digestive enzyme. You know, it's not like berberine or something like that. It's what it is is it's an enzyme that's used to trigger a chemical reaction in the body that then leads to some type of cellular metabolism.
Ed Jones: Well, that's a great explanation and if people are certainly everyone who's ever spoke to me at length or listened to the Holistic Navigator has understood that probably out of 84 there's at least 40 of those that the word insulin and insulin resistance will come up because it is what will devastate our health and it extremely corrosive to almost every mechanism within the human body at a certain age and that you know, there's not an age where you don't want to start having optimal levels. But when you've had it for 20 years and when I say insulin, I'm a huge fan of people blood testing it. [00:12:02] Because, you need to know what your insulin is and ideally I shoot for two and under and you know, if your people in double digits always say, let's at least shoot for getting in single digits because what happens when you have out of control insulin you first off many people have trouble losing weight. Secondly, of course the imbalances with blood sugar are terribly destructive to inflammation, and to free radicals and to faster aging so one of the absolute keys to slowing aging and aging gracefully is maintaining a low insulin level. Now people think insulin and glucose are the same thing. They're actually not there are related cousins, but I'm hugely more invested in keeping insulin low. That's why and I take a lot of supplements. There's no doubt. I do also believe in the power of the knife and fork not just supplements and exercise.
Carrie Pattison: Yep. Food is medicine.
Ed Jones: Yep. And so berberine has been part off and on of [00:13:02] my kind of system of nutritional support. But I think as we get older it's almost going to be a mandatory part to help keep the blood sugar in the controlled and the insulin and the controlled range. Obviously you would agree with all that.
Carrie Pattison: Yes, absolutely, you know, and you're talking about aging and I think that, you know, people automatically think about aging externally. And yes there, you know, like take your Biosil, those kind of things. But really what we're talking about is how we're aging internally and that's why we need berberine. And so, you know, I mentioned AMPK is referred to as the metabolic master switch. But well, it's also referred to as the longevity enzyme since its playing such a critical role in so many different processes that control how fast we age from a cellular level. So its main job is to [00:14:02] coordinate all those different functions and biochemical pathways within the body to really, you know, slow down those oxidative processes that are aging us right. Internal aging is really defined by how productive are biochemical processes are and oxidation, how our bodies utilize insulin is one of the key kind of differentiators that we can look at as far as how effectively our bodies are utilizing things like AMPK and slowing down those biological processes.
Ed Jones: Well, yeah, it's so as far as the person listening right now that okay, you know, let's say the average well at least you know 40 plus they are eating relatively healthy, but they really want to put together a supplement protocol, but they have family history let's say a blood sugar. [00:15:02] or memory loss or a lot of the things that come with aging would barbering be something that most people might throw into their supplement protocol based on what we already know as a prevention or is it something that they would use only if they were like had something acute or something that they saw that they really needed up. So preventatively is it okay to use it and what are the side effects of berberine?
Carrie Pattison: Yeah. Absolutely. I think I mean when I think of a berberine I think everybody needs to have been taking this right now berberine. I have a familial history of blood sugar issues and it's just one of those things where I'm like, well I want to do back. I want to do the best for my body in the future and perhaps, you know, prevent any sort of long-term issues and kind of get ahead of the game a little bit. But one of the reasons I've been suggesting berberine to people lately is also its support for our lipid metabolism. So, you know, it's wonderful to support, you know blood sugar [00:16:02] levels but it's also something that for people who have you know concerns about cholesterol levels here is another product that it can be really supportive. Because it's coming at these processes in a completely different function than other substances we take. And so, you know with its ability to support lipid metabolism one of the things that's doing is its just preventing the liver from making more cholesterol and so and it's helping to break down those excess fats. You know, it's a bitter we talked about better as being really useful for
Ed Jones: I absolutely love bitters.
Carrie Pattison: Like the ketogenic diet. Absolutely needs to be on berberine. I mean like as you're saying like who should unlike everybody needs to be taken berine. Just take berberine. And it you know, the best way to take it is with a meal because what it's doing is [00:17:02] working in the digestive system the amount of research that's coming out on how berberine is influencing our microbiome and therefore, you know working on even supporting neurotransmitter production. Like it's something that you know, we all want to be happy. Right? And so we need those happy neurotransmitters and lo and behold here's a compound that actually is supportive for making us happy on some level.
Ed Jones: Well, that's fantastic and we want to move on to the next product in a second. But I am going to do and the one thing you reminded me about it. I know the I am I looking to embrace so much conversations with nutrients and I don't always remember everything I had forgotten how good berberine was for diarrhea. So that's something that we'll have to put back on my radar. And you know, the thing is, you know, we look at these types of products, we have to get out of our mind that that the drug mentality of will you would only [00:18:02] they take a drug for a certain diagnosed reason. I take most of my supplements not for a specific reason I take it because I want to basically hack my physical and mental body. Hacking means I want to upregulate. I want to put an armor of protection. I want to slow things down that are damaging. You don't wait, you know, you don't have a car and then you start waiting at a hundred fifty thousand miles to change the oil because all of a sudden, it's not doing very well. You do the oil changing really early on so that you can make it 200 and 300 thousand. And the same with nutritional supplementation across the board. Yes. There are times to pick berberine or other herbs or other nutrients as more of a I needed because of this reason, but a lot of Berberine is going to be focused on keeping the machine running. Well, if you have a budget to support it and you are a supplement oriented person again, I go back to the whole[00:19:02] concept of I do not believe that supplements alone will keep us optimally healthy. You have to address food and the choices within that and I will say just because I tend to forget this at nutritionw.com is a sponsor of The Holistic Navigator and on their site you can order anything that you would ever desire as far as nutrients. Anything perishable shipped with ice packs. Very very very quality selection. Nothing that will be on that website that has not passed a stringent level of quality assurance. They do not sell things just to sell, they sell them because they are going to be the top quality and a very good value price so nutritionw.com.
Carrie Pattison: That's a really great point to make Ed. Sorry to interrupt but you know berberine because it has so many of these broad-reaching health benefits and it is being so studied and people are looking at it and people [00:20:02] I sitting benefits it means that it is something that is highly adulterated. And so going to a source that you know, like Nutrition World like, you know, these health minded retailers that are really very cultivating the proper products. I can't I can't stress that enough, especially when we're talking about, you know, taking something to benefit us. We want it to be the best quality that you can possibly get. Ed Jones: Absolutely and and there are many, you know, there's several really quality top of the line companies and I will say I'm and I'm not being paid by any means but Natural Factors is the one that I generally utilized myself. I've actually been to Natural Factors in Canada and probably have told the story a hundred times of never being ever more impressed with the quality standards that I observed over a period of four days at Natural Factors. It was a trip of a lifetime and I knew that there were a quality company, but I had no real clue at the level of which they were. [00:21:02] So Natural Factors, you just cannot beat them. Next product though is the one I'm really also super stoked about because you know, I have people constantly asking me, you know, so many questions, every day six days a week. I don't take off much. And there's one area of great frustration when they come in and they say I have neuropathy. I have chemo induced neuropathy. I have neuropathy and I don't have blood sugar issues. Neuropathy of course being kind of a burning sensation in the nerves and it's very very frustrating because normal pain medications really don't address the discomfort of neuropathy, like it would a muscle or a bone or something else and it can be very devastating to the quality of life of people. And I talk about the neuropathy end of the conversation that you know, the nerves are kind of like an electrical line and their electrical wires are coated with rubber. [00:22:02] And I try to use the analogy your nerves are also coated with things that are made of oil. What do we want them to be coated with? Omega-3s because if you're short of those the nerve can short-circuit. That's one. Number two is I believe, you know deficiencies of B12 and a few other things can also kind of beat need to be discussed. But I've never really found anything that a person can take that as they're addressing fixing the body, but also helps them to actually feel better. And I did get some samples of this product called PEA from a company a couple years ago and I started giving it out to a few people and I was supremely impressed how much better they felt. Not overnight. It did take weeks before this happened. So give us a little summary of this product called PEA.
Carrie Pattison: Yeah. Let's see if we can see if we can work this out here: palmitoylEthanolamide. Maybe. I'm not gonna try that again. [00:23:02] So PEA it is a supplement that also can help to activate AMPK. And AMPK does diminish and its ability to support all of our metabolic processes as we age and so that's why supplementing with one of these AMP activators is important like berberine, but PEA is another one. And what PEA what's so fascinating about it. This is one of those fatty substances that were just talking about Omega's right the importance of these really deep high-level good fats in our bodies. This is actually a biologically active lipid that is already endogenous in the body. Endogenous meaning it is naturally present. It's actually present in every single one of our membranes in our body. So anywhere you find a membrane, you're going to find PEA which is why it's [00:24:02] like one of those supplements that we talked about being so safe to supplement with because our body already makes it and produces it and it's already there. But what's really exciting about PEA is how much it interacts with the endocannabinoid system. One of the things that it's doing within the ECS specifically is its modulating it and it's positively influencing. So I know we talked a lot maybe about and you've talked a lot about you know, supplementing with exogenous cannabinoids in order to support our endocannabinoid system. But what PEA is doing is it's working in partnership with the ECS already since it is an endogenous product. So it has the ability to actually enhance the affinity of our own endocannabinoids towards their [00:25:02] receptors which I think is really cool to have something that's working in our body on this amazing system.
Ed Jones: And as you know everyone if they remember the word endocannabinoid, of course, we've spoke of CBD in pretty intensively over the past three to four years and that's the system too that is part of this endocannabinoid, which really is a master regulator of so many processes. And I kind of use the analogy if there's a you had an orchestra playing with 500 different musicians, the orchestra director is the key to having harmonious music. And endocannabinoids are part of the orchestra director. And you know, we know that CBD has a big role to play for certain purposes, but I don't find CBD to be as effective for neuropathy as I wished that it had been when I first started looking into it, but the PEA I have found that [00:26:02] that to be if a person sticks with it an amazing product. In fact, there was a lady who came to me about a year ago and she had scheduled a trip to Italy for about two-and-a-half to three months from the time she spoke to me, but she had chronic pain to a point of almost debilitation and yet there was no real structural issue at hand. But it was just on going and they're really what an autoimmune that I could determine from my conversation. And I recommended her to do high dose Omega-3s in PEA at a relatively high dose. She came back in four weeks and said she could not believe the difference in her physical being she came back three months later and said I went to Italy had the most wonderful time of my life and she was almost in tears because she was like, I don't think I could have done this without you and your advice. So I really, you know at that moment I knew PEA was a real deal. And so I mean the doses are not real high [00:27:02] of this people who have chronic pain or neuropathy. It would be an easy add-on. And again Natural Factors is one of the only three brands that I actually recommend of PEA because there can be some brands are not using the healthiest of processes to produce it.
Carrie Pattison: Yep some do synthetic versions. Yep. You want to make sure that you're getting the natural version because that's what your body recognizes and knows right? And also I remind people that micronized version is really what you want because you're looking at a fat substance and so it's not readily absorbed in your body. So micronization is necessary and because it helps with some absorption rates, but you know going back to what you were saying at the beginning looking at studies like PEA and berberine being substances that have just overwhelming amounts of research. I mean, there's nearly 600 scientific investigations and over 20 double-blind human [00:28:02] clinical studies on PEA. Like this is amazing to be able to talk about something that we know is support it for occasional pain and discomfort. But do you know how it's working? And it's interesting, you know talking about neuropathy what PEA what some of these studies are showing is that PEA is actually regulating glial and mast cells. So for listeners who don't know what glial cells are there actually a type of cell in the Central and the peripheral nervous system and that kind of act like the glue that holds the brain and the nerves together. But glial cells also another thing that they do is they facilitate nerve impulses or they're telling the nerve to fire. So when there is that misfiring happening the glial cells aren't doing their job properly that's where the nerves can end up with those pain situations. That's why you know when you were talking about neuropathy it's working directly with [00:29:02] with the glial cells to do that.
Ed Jones: That's so interesting. I've just actually brought up a study in the Journal of Pain research very very strong clinical study on the PEA and they were like, you know big time if you can you do two thumbs up from a medical study. This one had it on PEA and in fact said that there were no serious side effects reported in the entire study. They were reporting that had nor did it have any drug interactions. And these were four different patients they used it on. One had prostate cancer that has spread to the bones. The other had chemo induced neuropathies and the other had just terrible pain of unknown origin and they all made a point that it did not happen overnight PEA did take weeks before that. So is that the truth?
Carrie Pattison: Yes. Yes, you know most studies are suggesting. [00:30:02] 1200 milligrams daily and I let people give it three to six weeks maybe even more, you know upwards of eight. But I have to say, you know, everything every person's different. I gave it to a patient a couple weeks ago who just has chronic migraines and she didn't obviously it did not you know, stop what was going on. But she said she noticed a distinct difference pretty immediately which you know when you can just take a little edge off of that, like occasional pain and discomfort. Sometimes that's what you need. And so, you know, it's I'm excited for her to continue to take it and see what's happening because you know, it's also when it's working on mast cells this is why it's like another one of those things where it's just so broad reaching and its benefits. Mast cells are so critical and they're such a wel. they are critical that's a perfect word to use it part of our immune system. And so you know when we [00:31:02] talk about inflammation, which is a very challenging word to talk about but I'm talking about it in the fact that our immune system actually promotes inflammation. This is a good thing. I like to remind people that all inflammation is not bad but we need to be doing is supporting our body's ability to the inflammatory processes and mast cells are one of those things where if we have an It's of them it is it's going to lead and it can lead to these situations where we have this occasional, you know minor pain and discomfort. And so obviously my cells are also playing a role within the immune system and supporting the immune system is so that's a great thing right now. So we talking about so I when I look at PEA it's just another one of those things that I'm like what can't it do I mean what can't it do?
Ed Jones You know, I love that in some people [00:32:02] who are not maybe comfortable with supplementation and you know many people still have a doubt in their mind of safety or quality, you know, the media has not been super kind to the industry itself. And part of it is actually realistic. I mean, there are companies that are not stepping up to the plate and like every single product made in this in this world. You have different levels of quality. And the same with nutritional products now what I find is and I say this we have the highest level of safety as far as an internally used product in the nutrition industry of anything has ever been produced. And so we have a great track record. What I've fall really where I see the fall tree is is regard to a product that should be helping someone is not because it's poorly made. It's unlike drugs. I mean a drug if it's poorly made can kill [00:33:02] you if a drug is not made correctly the miscalculation of the potencies can also do very serious harm, but we're not dealing with drugs. We're dealing with natural substances where if they're truly natural the worst generally the worst thing that can happen is a belly ache or something else unless there's some drug interactions. And we now know enough information where we can kind of distill that down for people. I mean that you know, if people are on coumadin you don't want to be taking many supplements unless you totally do your homework with that because of the interactions. Luckily, you know, we have a group of people in this country which are called functional medicine practitioners who are now filling their toolbox with the types of information, advice, and products that are moving away from the pharmaceutical world as much as they can. In fact the third leading cause of death in this country is pharmaceutical drugs properly prescribed and properly taken. That was in the New England Journal of Medicine it in [00:34:02] use to be one of the highest levels of casualties in this country is the combination of using drugs, especially in older people. In fact, the average person today in the United States is on 18 drugs per year and that is a tremendous amount because people like me and probably you are using either 0 or 1 per year. So that means some people are using a lot more than 18 create that average. And so, you know again having safe remedies And in fact, you know, the pandemic is proven so clearly that if we can embrace things like raising vitamin D, taking NAC for lung Health, you know modulating the immune system with melatonin as Dr. Rountree, Dr. Michael Smith and Dr. Wilson, all three on The Holistic Navigator have spoke about in depth for enough time to educate anyone and I now have enough experience being that we've been in this pandemic for 6 solid [00:35:02] months the stories and the witnessing that I see it nutrition is life saving to a level that I was actually surprised about. The people who are educated who know how to have a tool kit ready if they're feeling bad are I mean, it's just a bad few days a week or two and they're perfectly fine. I will have to say and I think I've not said this on the Holistic Navigator I might have because I ran all day long but I did get covid at about two months ago. I was in Florida on a vacation which I rarely take, had the cough from hell one night. I woke up and then I got my goody bag because I had traveled with my immune supplements. And you have to do high dosing for three to five days or it won't work. Well I had about two nights of coughing and the coughing went away. I did have two weeks of less energy and less I taste was fine but less appetite but I was perfectly fine. I didn't even think I had until I did antibody testing three weeks ago and that's [00:36:02] when it came back the lab called and said you're the first person who has full antibodies against covid. And so I knew that was the moment I had gotten it. But the reason I was fine is because I had the toolkit I had the information. You can't wait till you're super sick and then start learning you need to embrace this now as far as what you can be prepared to do. And it doesn't matter if it's the pandemic or a flu or whatever is going around, have your medicine chest ready with the kind of natural remedies that you feel confident doing. I mean and try to find a health care practitioner who will be a partner with you on this process. They don't have to be experts. What they need to do is be accepting of the fact that you are of this mentality that you want the least amount of pharmaceutical drugs and you're going to embrace botanical medicine and please help me along this path. And I think a lot of people are starting to find those practitioners and if you don't have one fire the one you have and find somebody else because you they work for you people
Carrie Pattison: Absolutely you how many times I tell people that I'm just [00:37:02] like you can find somebody else. This is a partnership. Please do.
Ed Jones: It’s so frustrating at times if you are in a smaller town or you don't ever there's a lot of peer pressure and and the people don't everybody's on the same path. But things are changing we are going to and we have to embrace the people who will not kill us with the 18 prescriptions per year. There are prescriptions necessary. I'm not saying all drugs are bad. In fact, I said earlier. I think there's 10 stellar drugs out there, but there's also a like, I don't know how drugs are made but there's tens of thousands probably. But I you know what and I'm I will have to say I'm a I'm a self-appointed guinea pig. I love to be the one who experiments with everything and I've taken every supplement known to man. But when you take a lot of things things fall off the wagon and sometimes you don't replace them. Guess what I will be starting to take as of tomorrow's little packet of pills will be berberine twice a day and PEA because I actually have some chronic pain. If you look on my Instagram today [00:38:02] I was boxing and hitting the heavy bag again and I am walking around like a ninety-year-old this week because it just took the toll on my shoulders and my legs. But that's what it needs. The body needs to be tested and pushed in order to be stronger. So any last things you'd like to say about anything regarding PEA or berberine, please let me know now.
Carrie Pattison: I think that you know, when we talk about just overall support for the body and those healthy aging processes internally, externally everything you know, the more we learn about PEA, the more we learn about berberine the more I'm just shocked and amazed at the power of our body's ability to heal itself when we support it and in these beautiful safeways. And these are two products that have the research and have the results out there. And so, you know, I just I challenge people [00:39:02] to go out and just Google it. You know, you're going to find some really amazing things, but do be like this is for me as a practitioner. I'm very aware of the chances of somebody getting a product that doesn't have the potency, doesn't have the purity, the quality is just going to be detrimental to them. And so, you know find those trusted places that have the products that are what you want them to be so that you know that you're getting the benefits that research is showing to us.
Ed Jones: That is very very well said and you're exactly right. Finding trusted Partners does not just mean a practitioners. It means companies. And again, I'm not being paid to say this Natural Factors is one of my trusted partners because I always know I can recommend any of their products and they have every kind of quality control standard that has ever been in place in this industry. [00:40:02] In fact, I know for a fact that the quality standards even can exceed the drugs standards at times because of their ways and methods. So I just encourage people to shop wisely and find the partners and I cannot say enough Carrie. Thank you so much for such information.
Carrie Pattison: Thanks Ed. Such an honor to be here and spend this time with you.
Ed Jones: Well, hopefully we'll do this again in six months. And everyone listening thank you for spending your valuable time listening to The Holistic Navigator and we've got a whole list of exciting new topics coming up around the corner. Every time I think that I've kind of filled the encyclopedia with okay, this is I think we got enough now then I always think of another question I was asked or another piece of information that was just simply not clear with people. So clarity is one of my most valuable purposes in this Holistic Navigator. [00:41:02] We're in a sea of misinformation. We're in a sea of many conflicting tribes that are battling for turf and that can create sometimes some very bad outcomes for people because the packaging today of healthcare is so slick that you know, if you're feeling poorly you're not doing well, you're worried, you're fearful. They can hold a straw out with the type of packaging they have and it looks really good, safe and effective. So yes, I want to feel better. Let me have it. But to dig deeper is the key. This the wisdom of what truly is at the bottom of all this. Is it just to make money? Is it just to do this? Is your philosophy just to push the body around with pharmaceuticals?Not my philosophy because I've seen the the casualties mounting from the use of that philosophy and not respecting the magic of the intuition, the magical healing capacity [00:42:02] that we all are born with and you know, what you don't you don't have an ambien deficiency causing lack of sleep. You have been imbalances and imbalances can be cured by nourishment, food, and putting together kind of the functional medicine tree that we have talked about before. So I ramble too much. Thank you listeners and thank you Carrie and we will talk to all of you and hopefully you'll be listening next week for The Holistic Navigator.
Brian Strickland: The information on this podcast in the topics discussed have not been evaluated by the FDA or any one of the medical profession and is not aimed to replace any advice you may receive from your medical practitioner. The Holistic Navigator assumes no responsibility or liability whatsoever on behalf of any purchaser or listener of these materials. The Holistic Navigator is not a doctor or doesn't claim to be please consult your physician before beginning any health regimen.